


two by four

by sea_level



Series: Tumblr Ask Memes/Prompt Fills [1]
Category: Project Blue Book (TV)
Genre: Amnesia, Happy Ending, M/M, Mild Angst, memory recovery
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-12-17
Updated: 2019-12-17
Packaged: 2021-02-25 05:06:48
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,109
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21830452
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sea_level/pseuds/sea_level
Summary: Ask box meme request: waking up with amnesia auAllen wakes up in a hospital room surrounded by strange people and with no memories of who he is. The man from the Air Force tells him that they work together to hunt down aliens. Allen doesn't think that sounds right, but he doesn't really know enough aboutanythingto dispute it.
Relationships: J. Allen Hynek/Michael Quinn
Series: Tumblr Ask Memes/Prompt Fills [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1573036
Comments: 10
Kudos: 36





	two by four

**Author's Note:**

> from my ask box sorry for taking a million years but also i did say that i'd probably finish it at the end of the semester and this is then. i will be working on no other writing thing but the vampire fic until it's done so expect a chapter sometime soonish after i figure out how to write this one goddamn conversation that is very much giving me hell.  
> also sorry for it being long, i just can't leave things sad so i just took a long ass time getting to that happy ending
> 
> and yeah that's probably the most difficulty i've had writing the getting together part. that's what we call no real world experience, baby. how do people confess. i don't have a clue. what am i doing

When he comes to, his head is throbbing. He’s lying down, and he brings his hand up to his head as if applying pressure will take away some of the pain. It doesn’t.

“Doctor Hynek!” someone says. The name’s not familiar and neither is the voice, but whoever it is, he sounds happy and desperate and excited, so he looks over.

There’s a man in the room with him, a hospital room, he thinks, but he isn’t sure. The man is halfway out of his chair, in the process of bookmarking a book and setting it down on the table next to him. There are flowers on the table.

It’s not hard for him to figure out what’s happened. He’s been injured, somehow, been unconscious for a while. People have been worried enough to leave him with flowers, and this man must be one of them, based on the emotion in his voice. The man must be someone important, but no matter how hard he tries, he can’t remember him.

“Who are you?” he asks. “And where’s Mimi?”

The man falters and some invisible weight seems to descend onto his shoulders. Then, in a moment, it’s gone. His back is ramrod straight, and his expression is serious and commanding.

“I’m Captain Michael Quinn of the United States Air Force,” the man says. “I’ll fetch the doctor. He’ll want to know that you’re awake.”

The man walks out the door and closes it behind him, leaving him alone.

Last he checked, there wasn’t even a US Air Force. He doesn’t even know who Mimi is, much less why he would be asking for her.

He can’t even remember his own name.

+++

When the doctor shows up, the Captain isn’t with him. He feels a faint tendril disappointment, but he isn’t sure why, so he ignores the emotion out of habit.

The doctor shines a light in his eyes and asks him what he remembers. He remembers a lot. Inane facts and figures. Encyclopedic knowledge of topics he didn’t know he knew. He must be going for five minutes at least before the doctor tells him to stop and asks him if he knows anything about himself.

He draws a blank. Nothing of substance. That he is a man? That he has two hands and, presumably, two feet? He has a history and experiences. He’s sure of it, but, when he thinks, he thinks of nothing.

He relays this to the doctor who sighs and nods his head. He reaches over to grab the chart that he brought into the room with him. He scribbles something on it and then sets it back down.

The doctor tells him that is name is Doctor Allen Hynek, that he’s a professor of Astrophysics, that he liaises with the Air Force, but that’s all he knows and that he’ll have to ask the Captain. The doctor then stumbles over a quick and hesitant retelling of what must be Allen’s life story, but it feels strange like it doesn’t fit. It must be true though. He can’t think of why it wouldn’t.

The doctor helpfully informs him that he has amnesia and that his memory with either come back or it won’t, and if it doesn’t or if he has ongoing problems, he should likely consult some manner of psychotherapist or hypnotist. Somehow, Allen, if that really is his name, knows this already.

+++

Sometime after the doctor leaves, Quinn comes back and asks him what he knows about something named Project Blue Book.

Nothing.

Extraterrestrial life?

Allen relays a little bit, mostly speculative and theoretical.

Flying saucers?

Allen opens his mouth then closes it again.

“You know something?” Quinn asks.

“Nothing concrete,” Allen says. “It’s just something I’d like to study someday.” He knows it’s true when it comes out of his mouth, but not a second before.

“Huh,” Quinn says. “I’ve got to make a phone call.”

Quinn leaves the room again but is back soon enough, standing in the doorway.

“The, uh, the Generals,” Quinn says and then stops and swallows. His posture is straight and in control, but, for all that, he also somehow feels uncomfortably out of his depth. “You’ve been re-granted security clearance.”

Quinn moves a chair over down to his bedside, sits down, and recounts Allen’s life story with much more detail and familiarity than the doctor had. He also does it was an intimacy that Allen hadn’t expected. Had they somehow been involved? Sure, the Captain was beautiful but recognizing him as such would have been an indulgence he would never have allowed himself. Instinctive mental doors lock away the thoughts just as soon as they surface. And Mimi? What about Mimi?

The doctor had said that they were married, husband and wife, but when Allen thinks of her, there’s a faint tugging on his heart, a lonely warmth, a distant nostalgia. Something, Allen surmises, that you feel towards someone you once had a great passion for but that love has now simmered down to something more platonic, the memory more attractive than the actual relationship. The doctor had also said that she was bedbound and sickly. This falls upon Allen’s ears as strangely as his own name had.

When Allen asks Quinn about it though, the man tactfully evades the question and keeps telling him about the aliens (which may or may not even exist) that they’re tracking down on behalf of the US government. Allen lets it go without protest, the possible existence of extraterrestrial life beating out everything else for the attention of his curiosity.

+++

Quinn doesn’t stay overnight, claiming that he has to report back to the Generals, but he comes back in the morning for a brief visit, just long enough to drop off Allen’s journal and to answer a few quick questions about some of the cases that they’d apparently worked on together.

It’s a long day to spend alone with only occasional visits from various mental professionals checking in on his health. His vitals are fine and for the large part holding steady. He has a few minor electrical burns and some bruising, but they’ve mostly healed up when he was unconscious, and he’s well on his way to making a full recovery, amnesia aside.

He reads his journal like the Holy Bible, mostly because the handwriting is the most familiar thing he’s seen so far. It’s his. He knows it’s his, and therefore he can trust it.

Reading his journal is like watching an old television program he must have once watched ages ago. He knows the beats, the feelings, in the milliseconds before he reads them, but each page he turns reveals something that feels novel and new. There’s very little in it about Mimi. There’s a little bit of detail about a fight they had once that was soon after resolved, but after that, it’s just day to day stuff, and then nothing at all.

The strange things that Quinn had told them about their cases were all reconfirmed in the lines of his own semi-meticulously kept notes. It must be true. It has to be true, even if it doesn’t _feel_ like his own truth at the moment.

The doctor tells him his memories should start coming back to him soon enough in bits and pieces, but so far he hasn’t remembered anything on his own. In a brief moment of fear, he thinks he couldn’t live if he had to start over from scratch, never remembering everything he’s done and who he was. An hour later, he reconsiders. He doesn’t even know the other guy--the person that he was. Why should he hold him in such high regard? The more he thinks about it, the more and more paradoxical his thoughts become. In the end, he decides to go to sleep early. It had been the doctor’s recommendation anyway.

+++

When Allen is finally released from the hospital, Quinn takes him back to an empty house. The place is familiar, but it just doesn’t have that homey feel.

Quinn lingers in the kitchen while Allen goes from room to room, willing at least a few memories to come back to him. He doesn’t get anything that he can definitely call a “memory”, but he does get emotional responses he can’t explain with the information that he’s gathered about himself so far. The master bedroom, presumably his, evokes some kind of loneliness. A child’s bedroom, mostly cleaned out, warmth. His office feels almost like addiction. It’s so startlingly familiar, so deeply enticing, that he almost steps around the desk to take a seat. The only thing that stops him is the fact that he knows he has nothing to do. He might still know a lot of the things that he’s learned, but that doesn’t exactly mean he’s forming any new thoughts or theories.

He ends up in the living room last, and he’s not expecting anything until he’s suddenly hit by a wave of sadness. He lost something here, something that he’s still hurting over. For all the intensity of the emotion, though, he really has no idea what could have possibly happened here.

Allen slumps down on the couch, having lost the willpower to really do much else.

He doesn’t know how long he’s been sitting there, but eventually Quinn walks into the room and sits down on the couch next to him.

“You doing alright, Doc?” he asks.

“Do you know what happened to Mimi?” Allen asks.

“You didn’t tell me much,” Quinn says, “but from the sound of it, I think that’s something you should remember yourself.”

It’s not the answer Allen wants to hear, but it looks like it’s the only one he’s going to get. He leans back into the couch and stares up at the ceiling. The popcorn texture hides no secrets.

Quinn sits there in silence with him for at least a few more minutes before he finally asks, “Have you remembered anything yet?”

Allen shrugs.

“You’ll get your memories back,” Quinn says. “You’re good at pulling that kind of thing off.”

“What kind of thing?” Allen asks.

It’s Quinn’s turn to be silent, and Allen feels like he must have waited hours before Quinn finally answers. He says, “Miracles, I guess.”

He pats Allen on the shoulder, and Allen expects it to be some kind of goodbye. It isn’t, though, and Michael stays put right where he is. Allen is grateful, even if he never says it out loud.

+++

A few days later, Allen cracks an egg on the side of his pan and separates the two shells neatly so the whites and the yolk drop down and begin to sizzle in the hot oil. Just like that, it’s like some sort of dam bursts.

The cracking of the egg shell is hardly like the sound of a plastic phone receiver clattering to the floor, but he hears it anyway.

_Mimi’s waiting for him in the living room. They haven’t seen each other in two weeks, and Allen does feel guilty about Project Blue Book keeping him away from home all the time, but he really doesn’t feel guilty enough to stop._

_Mimi had laid down the threat before. If he doesn’t quit Blue Book, she’ll leave, and, based on the way she’s holding the phone gripped tightly in her hand and the determined look on her face, Allen knows that that moment has finally arrived._

_Mimi sees him and almost immediately drops the receiver in surprise. It clatters to the floor._

_“You really have no intention of leaving that job,” she says. It’s meant to be a question, but she and Allen both know that it’s definitely more of a statement of fact. Allen doesn’t reply. He knows Mimi will continue on soon enough._

_“I’ve built up my own life,” she continues. “Outside of you, outside of this. I’ve had to. I want that life now. I have to go.”_

Slowly, Allen sets the egg shells down on the counter next to the stove and puts the lid on the pan. He pulls out a chair from under the kitchen table, sits on it, and clasps his hands together tightly. He knows who he is now, and he really, _really_ wishes it felt as good as Quinn seemed to infer it would be.

+++

The other memories come back too. Thought they might have returned at the same time, it still takes a while for Allen to review everything that he’s forgotten.

He remembers the discoveries he’s made, the late nights on the road, the jokes, the bonding, all with Michael by his side. Allen starts to understand why Mimi had to make her own life. With all the time Allen was spending with Project Blue Book, he had certainly begun to make one of his own, and it was certainly a life that he couldn’t share with her, no matter how much he wanted to.

Michael drops by later with some yogurt under the doctor’s recommendations, though they both knew Allen was well enough to eat other food. Allen makes him something else to eat, something he knows Michael likes, and when Allen places it on the table, Michael’s eyes light up.

“Your memories,” Michael says, “did they...?”

“They’re coming back to me,” Allen says. “I think I’ve got access to them all.”

Michael chokes out a relieved laugh and sinks into his seat at the dining room table.

“Do remember what we were talking about?” Michael asks. “Right before you got hit over the head?”

Allen shakes his head. “Unfortunately, I haven’t been able to remember much from that night. The doctor said any short-term memories from then might be gone altogether. Why? What were we talking about?”

Some emotion flashes across Michael’s face, but it’s gone before Allen can identify it. “Just something about the case,” Michael replies. “I thought you might have had some ideas about it.”

“I could look through my journal again or take a peek at the case files,” Allen muses. He stirs his yogurt a little to distribute the blueberries in it a little better.

Michael shakes his head. “No, it’s alright. Turns out the ‘aliens’ were some kids fooling around in the woods.”

“Do you miss my insight that much?” Allen asks, not bothering to fight the slight smile that tugs at the corners of his mouth.

“Yeah, that must be it,” Michael says. His answering smile is smaller, more amused. Allen rediscovers that this more personal smile is something that he likes very much.

Still, unlike the rest of Allen’s lost memories, his brain doesn’t provide him any helpful insight as to what happened that night. They really could have just been talking about the case. They could have been talking about something else altogether. Allen has no way of knowing. Why would Michael bring it up, then, if it wasn’t really about anything important? Unless...

“Were we ever anything more than partners?” Allen asks.

Michael freezes. “I—no. We weren’t. What do you mean by—”

“I’m sorry,” Allen rushes to reply. “I shouldn’t have asked. I’ve got all my memories back. I don’t know why I would—” He definitely remembers now, all the times that he desperately wanted to tell Michael how much he cared about him, about how dangerous that was, and all the many, many, many times he’d fallen short. He’s buried those feelings down deep, deeper than the amnesia could reach. The ball is in Michael’s court. If Allen had said something that night, then Michael holds all the cards.

Michael, for his part, has returned to consuming his food with dedicated gusto. Allen figures he should do something of the same. Turns out rapidly slurping up yogurt just doesn’t hold the same gravitas.

+++

Allen’s back at work, poring through the new casefiles that Michael had written up in his absence, when Michael finally breaks. He stands up from his desk and walks over to the back door, the place where he usually goes for an outdoor smoke break, and gestures for Allen to follow.

Once they’re both outside, though, Michael doesn’t light a cigarette.

“I keep thinking about that conversation we had,” Michael says instead, “the one right before you got amnesia. I know you said that you’re probably not going to remember, but if you do, I don’t want your first thought to be that I lied to you, especially since we promised to strict honesty between us.”

“Michael, if it bothers you this much to talk about it, then you don’t have to say anything, as long as it isn’t going to put either of us in danger,” Allen says, though he doesn’t really feel a word of it. His curiosity has almost always been stronger than his kindness.

“No,” Michael says. “I should say it.” He takes a deep breath as if to calm himself, making Allen wonder why he doesn’t just take out a smoke. Instead of saying anything though, he just grabs one of Allen’s hands and holds it in his own. He stares into Allen’s eyes for just a little too long to be comfortable and then asks, “Do you remember now?”

Allen snorts out a laugh and the motion almost pulls his hand free but Michael tightens his grip and keeps them connected. “It doesn’t work like that,” Allen says. “You’ll have to tell me outright.”

Michael sighs and then falls silent again, his brows knitted together. Finally, he says, “A few days ago, do you remember when you asked me if we were anything more than partners?”

“Of course,” Allen replies.

“That’s what we were talking about,” Michael says.

“And what conclusion did we come to?” Allen asks.

“I like you,” Michael says, swallowing, “like that. But whatever you said then, I think that’s up for you to decide now.”

Allen’s feels a profound sense of excitement at his words like he might in the seconds before jumping off a plane. Michael, for his part, looks more nervous than Allen’s ever seen him before, and they’ve both been in their fair share of life-and-death situations.

“God, I do. Sometimes I even think I might love you,” Allen says. “It was wonderful, remembering you, remembering how important you are to me.”

“We’ll need to talk about this later,” Michael says.

“Dinner at mine?” Allen asks, and Michael nods in response.

Allen manages to sneak in a quick kiss on Michael’s cheek, nothing too apparent just in case anyone’s nearby before they head back into the office. It’s not until they have to sit down at their respective desks that Michael finally lets go of Allen’s hand.

**Author's Note:**

> 🙃
> 
> also i'm gonna post the other ask meme fics in a separate fic in this series. organization! cross-posting! i'll get to that! someday!


End file.
